This Weblog or "Blog" contains articles, events and opinions that support capital punishment in North Carolina and elsewhere. Author(s) of the contents are exercising their rights to free speech which unfortunately is often stifled or ignored by the media.
Contrary to what you might read or hear in the news, North Carolinians should be proud that an occassional and deserved execution is allowed to proceed.
- Wayne Uber

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Death Penalty Costs: Maryland

"Maryland Cost Study Problems: Urban Institute"Dudley Sharp,
2/2009

To: Maryland Legislature, Prosecutors and media throughout the
regionFrom: Dudley Sharp, contact info belowSUMMARY: The cost
errors, within the Majority Report, are so substantial that they cannot be
considered reliable. Is it likely that a properly managed death penalty system
would be less expensive than a true life sentence? Read on.Some
observations on the Urban Institute (UI) Cost of the Death Penalty in Maryland
(1) as well as on the Majority Report.The UI conclusion was that the
lifetime case cost for the 56 death penalty cases will cost Maryland taxpayers
$186 million, or $106 million more than if death wasn't pursued in those cases
or about $47,000 per year per inmate, more. The study found that the
average cost of a case where a death notice was not sought was $1.1
million/case, that being $250,000 for adjudication and $860,000 for
confinement/prison costs.Unfortunately, many more cases were used than
just those which make up life without parole (LWOP). This, wrongly and totally,
skewed the results.That was inappropriate from a public policy
standpoint and the majority and UI should have known it.The only public policy
cost discussion regarding the death penalty, nationwide, is the cost
differential between LWOP cases and death penalty cases. This is very well
known, If anyone doesn't know it, it would take 10 minutes online to figure it
out.It begs the question, why did the UI muddy the waters with a bunch
of cases that didn't get LWOP?Regardless of UI's reasons, the answer is,
they shouldn't have.Here's why.1) The public policy debate is
concentrated on LWOP as a considered replacement for the death penalty.
Sentences less than LWOP are not under consideration in this current
debate.2) By including cases of less than LWOP, within the non death
category, UI and the majority have lowered the costs of that category, perhaps
substantially, and has misled or confused the public as to the real cost
disparities, if any, which may exist between the death penalty and LWOP in
Maryland.3) Had UI only included LWOP cases in that category, the cost
disparity would be reduced, perhaps substantially.Using current data,
scenarios exist that could result in a finding that the death penalty may
actually be less expensive than LWOP. See below.What wasn't
calculated4) a) Each case, whereby a plea bargain to a sanction less
than death was rendered, the state saves about $250, 000/case for legal
expenses, based upon UI estimates.b) The number is, likely, far above
that $250,000/case evaluation, because 1) UI wrongly included non LWOP cases, thus reducing the overall costs, and
2) wrongly credited the cost reduction of those pleas, within the LWOP category,
when, instead, 3) a credit of $250,000/case, but likely much larger, should have
been placed in the death case data calculations, resulting in an additional
increase per case cost within the true LWOP category and a greater reduction in
the death case cost category. Why? Because the LWOP plea bargain ONLY exists because of the presence of the death penalty, therefore the plea cost benefits must be counted as a net cost savings in the death penalty ledger, the opposite of what UI did.Properly, this credit can happen only when LWOP
plea cases are isolated. This is public policy 101. The majority and UI wrongly
discounted plea bargains to a LWOP, when the discount belonged to the death penalty. If the plea credit is $250,000, then the UI misapplication creates a $500,000 error, as the UI wrongly credited LWOP with that discount, which, correctly, should have been applied to the death penalty.5) For example:a) Presume the average LWOP case,
resulting in LWOP, has adjudication costs of $500, 000, from pre trial to
conviction and throughout appeals. If a LWOP sentence was given as part of a
plea bargain, prior to a death notice being filed, UI shows that cost as $0 for
adjudication, thus lowering the average cost of all cases where death wasn't
pursued in potentially capital cases. That would be improper, from any
standpoint.b) A LWOP plea bargain can only occur because the state has
the death penalty. So, instead of lowering the average cost of all LWOP cases,
all LWOP plea cases would be removed from the LWOP database and a cost credit of
$500,000 would be applied as a cost benefit within death penalty category,
because it was solely the presence of the death penalty which allows for a plea
bargain to LWOP. Because of that proper transfer of credit, death penalty costs would
drop substantially and the average costs of LWOP would rise, substantially.c) That
results in two changes:

1) The average cost of LWOP cases will rise, possibly substantially,
because a $0 adjudication cost entry will be removed from the LWOP cases, thus inceasing the costs of the average LWOP case; and

2) The average cost of death penalty cases will be lower, possibly
substantially, because a $500, 000 cost reduction will be made to the death
penalty cost basis, for each such LWOP plea.To state the obvious, UI
made an error in reversing the credit in pleas.6) For an accurate public
policy review of death penalty costs vs LWOP costs, Maryland Legislators
should:a) Compare the costs of only the death penalty cases which were
pursued and a death penalty resulted and only LWOP cases that were pursued,
resulting in a LWOP sentence; andb) include the proper calculations for
credit of LWOP pleas bargains, which are solely the result of the presence of
the death penalty.c) Why exclude the death penalty cases which were
pursued, resulting in sentences less than the death penalty? For the same reason
we exclude LWOP cases which result in sentences of less than LWOP.You
should be looking , only, at true death cases costs vs true LWOP costs. If UI
wants to add a bunch of other cost categories, fine, but these are the two that
must be done.They weren't.COST SAVINGS - Death Row
incarceration1) The extra $350,000 per case for additional cost for
death row incarceration is an unnecessary waste of taxpayer money. Missouri
and Kansas don't have a death row for their death sentenced prisoners.2)
There is no reason that death penalty appeals should take longer than 7-10
years.

a) Both appellate paths, direct appeal and writ, should travel through the
appellate process, at the same time.

b) The legislature, trial and appellate courts should work together to
establish reasonable time frames for appeals and responses to them.NOTE, as of 2011, Virginia had executed 72% of those sentenced to death and had done so within 7.1 years, on average, since the modern death penalty era, post Gregg v Georgia (1976).

GERIATRIC CARE - Prisoner geriatric care has recently been found to be
about $70,000/inmate/year, on average. Has that been calculated in Maryland?

REQUIREMENTMaryland must redo their calculations to compare costs
of true LWOP cases to death penalty cases, for two reasons. First, it is
the only public policy cost issue which exists, with regard to the death penalty
in MarylandSecondly, what you have, now, cannot be relied upon. The Minority Report

"The Urban Institute study that puts the cost of the death penalty at $186
million over twenty years is, at best, inflated and at worse, ridiculous."(2)

"The simple fact is that if the death penalty is repealed, no prosecutor,
judge, clerk or public defender will lose their job." (2)

"Not one actual dime will be saved.(2)" if the death penalty is abolished.

UI: Additional Errors in Judgement

UI's reliance on Donahue and Wolfers (2006), who have been highly critical
of some of the recent studies finding for deterrence, was unwarranted and
inappropriate.UI's authors failed to note that Donahue and Wolfers
criticisms have been dissected and trashed by those authors whose studies found
for deterrence. I believe all of those replies, heavily critical of
Donahue and Wolfers, were published prior to the UI report.

Furthermore, UI failed to mention that Donahue and Wolfers' work was
not peer reviewed, but many and most of the studies finding for deterrence were.
Had Donahue and Wolfers work been peer reviewed, it is a question if it ever
would have been published in a peer reviewed publication.Both of these
points are important and inexcusable omissions by UI.

Instead of mentioning the rebuttals, UI, instead, deferred to Donahue
and Wolfers, as a way of neutralizing the importance of the studies finding for
deterrence, and then mentioned a study which found against deterrence.UI
wrongly states that studies go either way so we shouldn't bother with
them.Total nonsense. 16 (now 28, as of 2012) recent studies, including
strong rebuttals to criticism, find for death penalty deterrence.In one
reply to Donahue and Wolfers, after their data had been re-run, based upon
Donahue and Wolfers criticism:"I oppose the death penalty. " " But my
results show that the death penalty (deters) — what am I going to do, hide
them?" "Science does really draw a conclusion. It did. There is no question
about it." "The results are robust, they don't really go away" "The conclusion
is there is a deterrent effect.". Prof. Naci Mocan, Economics Chairman,
University of Colorado at Denver, "Studies say death penalty deters crime",
ROBERT TANNER, Associated Press, June 10, 2007, 2:01 PM ETFurthermore,
one of the deterrence studies found a $70 million cost benefit, per execution,
because of the number of lives saved per execution.Obviously, that would
render the death penalty a huge cost benefit in Maryland.Many other
important conclusions of the deterrence studies were omitted from the UI report.
If UI didn't wish to give a proper, accurate review of deterrence, stay away
from it. Why wrongly muddy the waters?Public policy makers take
note.

UI's Misleading ConclusionThe UI authors stated that: "Prior
research on the costs of capital punishment in other states unambiguously finds
that capital cases are more expensive to prosecute than non-capital cases.
"To "prosecute", generally yes, but not always. And when did the
studies ONLY look at prosecution?In one of UI's included studies, Cook,
North Carolina Cost Study (1993), the UI authors seemed to have missed a very
important and obvious point.The study finds that, for two different
calculations, that the death penalty costs $163, 000 and $213,000/case more than
a life sentence. But, the calculation for a life sentence is only to 20
years. For a true life sentence, you would be adding $300, 000 or more
to each life case, meaning that a life sentence costs more than the death
penalty. Furthermore, the authors conceded not including geriatric care,
recently found to be $69, 000/inmate/yr. meaning lifers cost a lot more than
death sentenced prisoners, possibly adding an additional $300,000/case, or more,
for a true LWOP sentence.That could render life cases $600,ooo or more,
more expensive than death sentences in North Carolina.Furthermore, the
calculations didn't include the benefit of plea bargains to life, possible only
because of the death penalty. Unambiguous, UI? Not close.Based
upon the UI authors not seeing these very obvious and important facts, or
deciding not to share them within their report, one may conclude that UI authors
may have made similar errors or omissions in their review of the other included
studies.Reviewers should keep that in mind.CONCLUSIONUI,
a public policy institution, avoided the only public policy issue which exists
in the death penalty cost debate: "What is the difference in cost
between the death penalty and a true LWOP?"Depending upon the number of
plea bargains to LWOP, there may be very little cost difference between the
death penalty and LWOP.Furthermore, if both the presence of the death
penalty, as well as executions, saves many innocent lives, as 16 (now 28) of the recent
deterrence studies (1) suggest, then the benefit of the death penalty far
surpasses any alleged cost deficit, if any, or is a huge added benefit to any
cost benefit of the death penalty, if there is one.
======

(2) Page 13-15, withinThe Minority Report of The Maryland Commission on Capital
Cases, which is hidden, between pages 128-129, within the Majority report. The
Minority Report is not even listed within the table of contents, yet is 22 pages
long, longer than all but one of the sections in the Majority Report.

MARYLANDCOMMISSION ON CAPITAL PUNISHMENT FINAL REPORT TO THE GENERAL
ASSEMBLY
December 12, 2008,